Friday, October 21, 2011

Full disclosure: I am a big Yankees fan who very much enjoyed seeing the Red Sox totally choke at the end of the season. Since then, they've undergone may personnel changes and the fingerpointing has started. Last week an article came out in the Boston Globe saying the manager was distracted with a divorce and pills and people were more interesting in eating chicken, drinking beer and playing video games than what was going on on the field. If their late-season collapse wasn't enough, this certainly has put many people over the edge.

The issue, though, is that this would have never been a problem had the Red Sox kept on winning. When things are going right, people are very adept at sweeping issues under the rug. When things go wrong, the fingers come out and people get scape-goated--especially those who aren't in the organization any longer. This is not just on a baseball team; this occurs in many companies today.

When things were going well in the mid 2000s, no one wanted to say anything about excess and greed and corruption and shadiness. But when the market started tanking in 2008 and people lost their jobs, fingers started to be pointed. Now companies tout the fact that they cleared out the bad apples and they are trustworthy again.

The key is to make sure during good times that these problems aren't out there so you're not left pointing fingers when things go wrong. Every company has a hiccup now and again, but how you handle it before, during and after a hiccup can go a long way to determining what type of company you are. And right now, the Red Sox don't look like a great organization.